


Never Let You Down

by LittleLynn



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Prequel Trilogy
Genre: Canon Compliant, Force Ghost Qui-Gon Jinn, Heavy Angst, M/M, Post-ROS
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-07
Updated: 2020-07-07
Packaged: 2021-03-04 19:14:07
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,660
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25131460
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LittleLynn/pseuds/LittleLynn
Summary: “Even after- after everything, you are still the hardest thing for me to remember. And doesn’t that make me detestable? That I would rather remember what I- what I did to Anakin, than I would your laugh, or your smile, or the way you used to lay your hand on the side of my neck when you- when you were proud of me. Are you proud of me now master?” Obi-Wan broke down, head nearly between his knees as he clawed unkindly at his own hair. Qui-Gon’s hand’s couldn’t steady him, not real enough to reach through and touch.
Relationships: Qui-Gon Jinn/Obi-Wan Kenobi
Comments: 8
Kudos: 62





	Never Let You Down

**Author's Note:**

> I just needed to get this off my chest, apparently. Enjoy, or whatever the equivalent from of emotional fulfilment we get from reading angst is <3

The first time he came, Obi-Wan had thought he was still dreaming; new spectres to haunt him, as if the sight of Anakin burning and broken wasn’t fresh in his mind, as if he needed new spectres; as if he ever would. 

Yoda had told him that it was possible, and Obi-Wan had tried, yearned and called to the force with every fibre of his being. And then at its answering silence he had raged, beaten his fists bloody on the walls of the hovel he had taken refuge in, cursed and screamed for it to give something back to him, just this one thing; hadn’t the force taken enough from him already. But still, only silence had greeted him.

So the first time he came, Obi-Wan had thought he was still dreaming, because he didn’t get things back, he was just left a ruin, alone and with no one, only the ghosts of people he had loved - because he had, no matter what the code had said - and let down in the most catastrophic ways. He looked back at the wake of bodies, and wondered if they were all his doing, one way or another. Protect Luke? Laughable, he should stay far far away.

He had been sat, staring blankly at the plain wall, trying not to think of anything at all. And then there was the ghost of a hand on his cheek, wiping away a tear Obi-Wan hadn’t realised was there. 

“Oh, Obi-Wan,” a voice that he remembered better than his own, days filled with sand and silence now, assaulted him with its softness, dug its blunted nails into his heart. Where there had been one tear now Obi-Wan started crying, this was cruel, even for his mind. “Shh Obi-Wan, what is wrong?” translucent blue arms encircled him, touching and not touching, cold and warm, there and not there at all. 

“I thought I was awake,” Obi-Wan replied, voice croaky with under-use, wondering when he had started to lose touch entirely, between one mile of sand and the next.

“You are, you are Obi-Wan,” that voice as deep and soothing as he remembered it. Obi-Wan shook his head with what little energy he could find.

“You never come when I call.”

“I am so sorry, Obi-Wan, I try, I promise I do. Manifesting is hard but I am getting better at it. Even when you cannot see me, I am here,” the spectre promised him. Obi-Wan shook his head.

“This is just a dream anyway.”

“It isn’t, my Obi-Wan I promise you. What can I do to convince you,” the ghost tried to grab a small cup of water and douse Obi-Wan with it, but he was barely manifested and all he succeeded in was knocking it to the floor. “Reach out with your feelings Obi-Wan, know that you are awake.” The ghost pleaded, and Obi-Wan was trained at a young age to do as told by that voice, trained when he was older, by his own heart, to do whatever that voice wanted. Relinquish his place by Qui-Gon’s side, so that he could take a new apprentice. 

If he had run faster, had been a better padawan, a better jedi; he wouldn’t have been caught in that corridor. He could have saved Qui-Gon, and he in turn could have saved Anakin from Obi-Wan, and everything else that had plagued him while his master stood by unknowing, too preoccupied with masking the way he was drowning in his own illicit sorrow, to notice the way Anakin was slipping. 

Obi-Wan reached out with his feelings and recoiled and he found himself awake, when he brushed up against a bond that ran as deep as his own soul, and had been ruthlessly sheared off in the Naboo.

“Go away,” Obi-Wan whispered, though he didn’t try to pull away; it had always been Qui-Gon pulling away from him, anyway. He heard a breath that wasn’t there hitch. 

“Do you really want me to go?”

“I wish you had never left me,” Obi-Wan admitted into the gloom of his home. “Even after- after _everything_ , you are still the hardest thing for me to remember. And doesn’t that make me detestable? That I would rather remember what I- what _I_ _did_ to Anakin, than I would your laugh, or your smile, or the way you used to lay your hand on the side of my neck when you- when you were _proud_ of me. Are you proud of me now master?” Obi-Wan broke down, head nearly between his knees as he clawed unkindly at his own hair. Qui-Gon’s hand’s couldn’t steady him, not real enough to reach through and touch.

“Obi-Wan, please, stop.” Cold wisps at his hands, but nothing that could stop the way he ripped at himself. “Anakin was not your fault, you cannot control the choices he made, please Obi-Wan.”

“Of course it was my fault, it was all my fault,” Obi-Wan thought he might shout, but all he managed was a whimper. “Attachment is forbidden and I was drowning in my love for you. You died and it changed me and I told no one, hid the truth, and Anakin suffered for it. Did you know I was so broken, is that why you cast me aside so easily when another crossed your path.”

“Obi-Wan no, that was the worst mistake of my life I wanted you to be free, I thought I was - ” Cold wisps, trying and failing to stop his own hands yanking roughlyat his hair, just for something to feel.

“I wish I had died. I wish Maul’s saber had taken me not you. You would’ve been a good master to Anakin, made none of the mistakes I did. If I had just died there none of this would have happened, everyone would still be alive and I wouldn’t feel like this, I wouldn’t just keep failing you over and over. I wouldn’t - ”

“Please Obi-Wan, please stop, I cannot bear it.” Obi-Wan had never heard his master so desperate. Cold wisps again, and then, pressure, fingers gripping his hands, if only for a second. “I loved you. I loved you more than anything, more than life itself. I love you still, even now. I don’t reach out to you with jedi serenity or because I am one with the force, I reach out with a desperation, with a suffocating need to be near you, to comfort you, to hold you.”

“What?” Obi-Wan’s voice was quiet and weak, but his hands had stilled, as if if he stayed perfectly still, Qui-Gon might be able to touch him again. 

“If our places had been reversed, and you had been the one to die, it would have fixed nothing. I would have been lost to despair entirely, I am not as strong as you Obi-Wan, I could not have continued on without you. And Anakin would have been alone in this world, and the sith would have found it even easier to corrupt him, without your light shining by his side. Look at me Obi-Wan, please.” Obi-Wan gasped when for the barest moment, he felt a hand on his back. Shakily, he straightened and looked at his master, fresh tears flowing down his face as he catalogued eyes he’d never forgotten, a face he remembered perfectly, with a destroyed kind of clarity.

“I should have done more, I wasn’t enough for him. The last thing you asked me to do and I wasn’t enough, I - ”

“It is not your fault, Obi-Wan. I never should have put this on your shoulders. It is not you who wasn’t enough, you could never be,” Qui-Gon said, Obi-Wan didn’t believe him and sunk in on himself again. 

“Will you leave me again?”

“I cannot hold this manifestation indefinitely.” Regret stained the words. Cold wisps on Obi-Wan’s cheek, making his tear tracks like ice, but he didn’t look back up.

“Please don’t leave me. I can’t- I have nothing. I need, I need you. I’ve always needed you. I don’t know how to do this.”

“I’ve never left you, I am always here.” Obi-Wan looked up as Qui-Gon’s ghostly cloak began to flicker.

“Come back, please, come back,” he begged desperately, reaching out, hands hitting nothing but cold air. He noticed his hand in the place where Maul’s saber had pierced his master and snatched it back violently. 

“I will as soon as I can, I promise. I will never leave you Obi-Wan, I will never - ” whatever he was saying faded into nothing along with his spectre, and Obi-Wan’s hands hung uselessly by his sides.

\-----------

He didn’t believe Qui-Gon would return to him again. Why would he, after seeing the creature Obi-Wan had been reduced to. Waking up in a cold sweat every night. Not leaving his house for anything more than scavenging food. Safer that way; for the galaxy or for him. 

But then there he was again, clearer this time, though there would never be any mistaking what he was now. Because Obi-Wan had not run faster. Because of Obi-Wan. 

He broke down again, just from seeing him, just for the miracle that even after what he had seen, Qui-Gon had come back to him. Qui-Gon murmured to him that he would always come back, and Obi-Wan felt fingers in his hair, slowly stymying his heaving, gutteral, sobs.

Qui-Gon told him things he never did while living, things that were fantastical to Obi-Wan, that he had been loved in return, that they had both harboured feelings that went beyond what was allowed, far beyond. He told him that he loved him. That he would stay. He told him lies too, that none of this was Obi-Wan’s fault. They were nice to hear anyway. He almost thought that he had gone mad, and in a fit of desperation his mind had conjured something to cling to. 

He still imagined it could be true, in his darker moments. He decided it didn’t matter, he would have Qui-Gon back however the universe saw fit to give him. 

\-----------

As time wore on, Qui-Gon learned how to stay for longer, how to move things. How to feel and be felt, and Obi-Wan thought he would shake apart when Qui-Gon held him, touched him, any way he could. And then he did shake apart, when he inevitably faded and went away again. For days or weeks, never more. He’d reappear, and put a shaking Obi-Wan back together again. 

He tried to hide his forlorn expression when he found Obi-Wan rebroken every time, Obi-Wan tried to ignore the new guilt at disappointing him again, in these new ways.

\-----------

He found a way, somehow, perhaps just from Qui-Gon’s sheer force of will, to believe him when he said that he’d loved Obi-Wan; when he said that he still did was harder, but Obi-Wan crawled his way there. Easier, when he could feel those arms around him. 

“You would have left the order for me, wouldn’t you.”

“Yes,” Qui-Gon’s voice encompassed him as much as his arms did, eradicated the world outside, the sand, the darkness of the night sky. 

Obi-Wan believe him, and found a new guilt to hold.

\-----------

“Will you go outside today, my Obi-Wan?” 

“No,” Obi-Wan said, Qui-Gon faded faster out in the world, away from this sanctuary, filled with things of Obi-Wan’s that he could hold on to. 

“You could check in on Luke.”

“Please, don’t. I can’t- he looks- he looks like- ” Obi-Wan’s voice shattered and Qui-Gon curled closer around him, hushing him, soothing him, apologising. For what? Obi-Wan thought. 

\-----------

“You could visit the market today,” Qui-Gon’s voice murmured as he ran his fingers through Obi-Wan’s hair, growing long and ragged. He stayed silent and didn’t respond. “They may have some tea blends you have never tried.”

Obi-Wan closed his eyes and lost himself to the feeling of long-lost fingers in his hair. He had barely known soft touch before Qui-gon had died, now he craved it, even with the slight chill Qui-Gon’s fingers brought, it warmed him. 

“Speak to me, Obi-Wan, please,” a kiss dropped to his shoulder, faint, but undeniably there. Obi-Wan turned in his arms, buried himself against a chest that was almost not there at all. 

“I want to stay here with you.”

“It would be good for you.” Concern and sadness, Obi-Wan had let him down again. 

“Please don’t send me away. You might be gone by the time I return.”

“I will always come back.”

“Please. Perhaps next time, but please, please don’t ask me to leave.” He tightened his grip on Qui-Gon’s ghostly clothes. Qui-Gon murmured something he couldn’t hear, and held him.

\-----------

“There is little in your pantry, Obi-Wan, you have to be careful on a planet like this.” Qui-Gon moved entirely silently around the house, Obi-Wan’s hand wrapped in his, as he had clung when Qui-Gon stepped away for a moment. Qui-Gon had smiled sadly and laced his warm fingers with Qui-Gon’s cold, ghostly ones. 

“I’ll get some more in, the next time you’re away.”

“You look so thin.”

“I’m sorry,” Obi-Wan looked away, ashamed. Relieved when large arms encircled him. He was too old to be behaving in this way, he felt too fractured to behave in any other. 

\-----------

“You look as though you have not moved from when I last faded.”

“I - I don’t. There was nowhere I needed to go.” He managed, stumbling forward with relief at seeing him again, newly surprised every time he returned.

“You could have gone out, while I was away. Taken some air, gone to the market, anything.”

“I worried you would come back and I wouldn’t be here, that I would miss you entirely.” He admitted, what could be so important out there, that he would risk missing Qui-Gon.

Qui-Gon’s face became unreadable, and Obi-Wan wondered if he had finally had enough. But he held Obi-Wan close until he was forced to let go again. 

\-----------

“I don’t think it helps you to have me here. I wanted to comfort you, be with you, but I realise now that that was selfish. I am hurting you, I am hurting you so completely. I should go.”

“No, no please- ” Obi-Wan shot up in the bed, more energy than he had exhibited in months, out of those not-there arms as he dragged a blanket around himself with tight fingers, even though it was blazing hot everywhere. “Please don’t. I can’t - I can’t. Not again I can’t do it again. You’re all I have, the only thing- reason I’m here at all anymore. I can’t- I need- I need- I need-” He broke down in heaving sobs, shoulder wracking with it. Qui-Gon lurched after him, startled by the outburst, gathering Obi-Wan close and holding. Obi-Wan wished he could hear his heart beating. 

“I am making this worse my heart. I am making this harder, I’m hurting you. I’m causing this. You need to let go.”

“Please, please no. I need you, I need- ” Like a corrupted piece of code, stuttering and stuck on the same line of ones and zeros. To think, he had once been eloquent. Qui-Gon had always praised him for it. “I can’t let you go, please don’t leave me. I can’t- ” If Qui-Gon had been truly corporeal, Obi-Wan’s grip would have bruised. Were it not for Qui-Gon’s hold, he was sure he would have shattered out of his skin already. In that cold embrace, Qui-Gon began rocking him soothingly.

“Shh. Hush Obi-Wan. I am sorry. I am so sorry. I won’t leave you. I could never leave you. I shouldn’t have said anything, I was being a fool. I will never leave you, I promise. I will never leave you here alone.” A mantra in Obi-Wan’s ear, over and over in varying iterations until he stopped shaking, ran out of tears, settled back in Qui-Gon’s hold, a mockery of whole. 

What would it make of them, Obi-Wan wondered, if he couldn’t let go and Qui-Gon couldn’t leave. 

**Author's Note:**

> Soz, if it makes you feel better I upset myself just as much


End file.
